lives, I have no car for you. I am sure he is no less yr spirituall father then yr naturall. I praye God, you may hould him fast. But alas! you must att last, you must, when God calls, lett him goe. Be sure, therfor, to make benefitt of the time mercy indulges him to you; and pray I may not out live yr happinis in him, for, being totally unable to give you any comfort my self, twod prove an unsufferable cross, to your poor, but most affectionat aunt, W. T. When you rit, be sure to tell me perticulers of each of you, for really my love is so perticuler to every one, boys and girls, that a generall accoumpt serves not my turne. When you see worthy Mr Morgan, give him my best respects, though I shall never clearly forgive his forsaking Lovaing: tell him, ould dear father lives now, I thinck, onely to give us a pattern how to dye. He is so weake, not able to goe one stepp, nor scarce to speake to be understood by any, but thos that are continually about him. Yet so cherful in the expectation of death, that he even vexes me to see him so long to leave us. Tother day, hearing him sigh, 1 I demaunded the cause. He tould me he long'd to dye. I answerde, he was about itt. He replyed, O may itt bee this day, this hour, this moment. His teares mayd out the rest. You may be sure he wept not alone. We dayly expect his death, wch will bee his ioy, but unspeakable grife to your poor affectionat aunt, W. T. LETTER LXXX. FOR MY DEAR Girls, My dear sweet girls you must not think your sister Keat is dead, though my ioys bee so. She truly lives, and shall never dy. She laughs at our fond tears, for God has wyp'd her eyes.* Wonder not that I speak so confidently, for all * The same sentiments are very poetically expressed in Lycidas:→→→ Weep no more, woeful shepherds, weep no more; For Lycidas your sorrow is not dead, Sunk though he be beneath the wat❜ry floor; So sinks the day-star in the ocean bed, that saw her virtues, (which is every one in the house) thinks what I say. This last half year God was pleased to try her with much infirmity and great paines, especially in her head; in that extremitie, that somtimes she could not speak; but she had made a bargan with me, that when she held up her fingar, I must torn to God for her, with a fiat voluntas tua. Just the night before God took her from me, she had been discoursing with one of our sisters, who lamented the misery of humaine frailty, that drags us somtimes to doe or say, what wee know to be amiss. No, sed she, say not so, tis too true, that we often frayly doe amiss, but I cannot belive that any will doe ill, when they perceive itt so. When this was told our father, he aunsered, she measured others by herself, for she never did. Ile say no more, least I coole yr devotion in praying for her, and we must remember, our judgments fall infinitly short of allmightie Gods, in whose sight the very stars are not pure. I am your too much affectionat aunt, W. T. LETTER LXXXI.* HOND. DEAR BROTHER, I will not measure you, by my owne weake hart; you understand better the kings high • This letter relates the death of Mrs Henry Thimelby, sister of Herbert Aston, and wife of Henry Thimelby, brother to Sir John Thimelby of Irnham. Her husband dying young, and leaving her an infant, which soon followed its father to the grave, she became a nun in the convent at Louvain. See above, letters xlvii, viii, and ix. Mrs Thimelby was a poetess, and many of her compositions are preserved in the “ Tixall Poetry." I shall here give two shortones as specimens of poetical powers.— To her husband on New Year's day, 1651. How swiftly time doth passe away, Where happiness compleates the day! Weeks, months, and years, but moments prove To those that nobly are in love. This computation's only knowne To them that our pure flame can owne. |